To Dance Free In Valimar Once More
by Moonstone Tears
Summary: A short story from Nessa's point of view as she dances for her lover Tulkas upon the lawns of Valimar


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WARNING: This may be pushing it with 'serious' Tolkien fans, but I have gone into details about Nessa and Tulkas' part in the music, and what they could have sung of. Remember this is just my humble take on Tolkiens great characters and I am but a lowly reader =) 

The darkness had pressed so tightly in on us on that fateful day. 

Smothering, coiling, suffocating, along with the cries that lay thick in the darkness.

Cries of war, cries of desperation, cries of madness. 

The sound of Nienna's weeping had been strangely comforting in that hour in fact, but it also carried much sorrow, for never before had she wept for us. Never had the tears fallen from her pale eyes for the other Valar, for never had there been a plight such as what there was that moment.

Melkor had been winning the battle.

Most of us had not understood what evil was then. It had been a strange concept to the other Valar – especially to Manwë who had not a touch of it within his being. The others had not been able to comprehend it, and so knew not how to fight it, thinking it possible Melkor would realise his folly and cease his destruction for once and for all.

Only three of us had really known this redemption was not possible from the very start. 

Varda had known, for she knew Melkor's heart from the very beginning of the music. She perceived the darkness within him and Melkor hated her for this awareness, and he hated her for she held a light within her that he could not endure. Varda sang of the stars of heavens in the beginning. Of light and purity, of all things Melkor most greatly despises, for he is in all ways a creature of darkness.

My husband and myself were the other two who were aware of what Melkor really was, for we were beside him in the making of the music, and our melody touched his and he stole from us our song and warped it into something unrecognizable. It is for this very reason that I believe that we were the first to know what evil really is, for we sang the main harmony of his song in the beginning.

However, I am not among his subjects and I have not taken the path of destruction and desolation. I am also not accounted among the wise, or amongst the mighty. In fact I am not really considered important to the other Valar at all… lest they be Astaldo the Valiant, the only one who heard my suffering. 

The only one who saved us that day.

The only one who saved _me_.

'Who shall save us?' I had cried that day in my terror and sorrow, 'for Manwë falters and we lose against the night! I shall fall alongside my brethren and the world shall know its end before it has even begun!'

Tears of sorrow had fallen from my eyes then, and I had wept alongside Nienna and our grief raised the very waters of the seas as we drowned the lands with it.

It was then that I heard the sweetest sound I have ever known.

His laughter.

Later he had told me that he had heard my call and been summoned to my side from his love for me and for his determination to stop something which he believed he had started.

The clouds had shifted at Astaldo's entrance into battle, his mirth breaking the power of Melkor in an instant, for Melkor had grown afraid at the sound and had retreated.

His laughter had filled the valleys of the world, had sailed over the mountains, and echoed across the seas. 

I believe Melkor had not known such fear before that moment, when my beloved stepped out from the Void and cast him down. 

Melkor had fled then, knowing his match and my kin had cried out to my future husband in joy and thanks, 'Astaldo, Tulkas Astaldo!' they had sung out, 'You bring back the light of hope with your laughter! You restore peace to us and to Arda that we had for a moment thought lost for all time! Grateful we are to you, now come! Come and feast with us!'

Of course he had just given a joyful laugh in return and then his eyes had found mine where I sat and he knew me then, and I knew him, for we remembered our song together in the making of the world in the very beginning. 

The memories of our song returned to me as I looked into his piercing blue eyes and I recalled with a heart heavy with love the sound of his voice in the chorus of the Valar. His song had been low and strong, resounding deeply amongst the other voices, his melody speaking to me in a way that none other could. He had sung of strength raw and powerful, along with joy open and free. He had sung of a joy that bubbled clearly upon the surface, a joy that lingered even in his anger.

Our songs had been so different – but yet they had been ultimately the same, for if he sung of joy, so too did I, but I sung of joy deeper and closer to the soul. I too had sung of strength, yet the strength of ones heart.

He sung of the hunter, I the hunted.

Where I fled, he pursued. 

Where I faltered, he pressed on.

And yet, we sung of the same tune and our song grew powerful and beautiful in its way.

And so it became a dance of sorts with us, our voices harmonizing in our way as they complimented each other, and also because we sensed Eru's joy at our union.

Even when the great discord arose and Melkor broke the harmony for his own did Tulkas and I cling to our song. 

Where even Varda and Manwë were hesitant and afraid, Tulkas and I held tight to our vision.

And yet, our song aided in the discord of Melkor, for of opposites we sang, and of opposites so where there created.

Black and white, up and down… good and evil.

We made not the things to which opposites were… we made not light itself, nor darkness. No, we only sung of the _idea_ of contrasts, and it was Melkor who took this song in his discord and twisted it to create the opposite of things he despised. Light he hated, and so darkness he sung of. He made the extremes, taking our beautiful dance and weaving it into fire and into ice.

He twisted our love of the music of the Ainur into something incomprehensible.

He distorted beauty into hideousness itself.

Eru, Lord of all, had known of our regret for singing the song which Melkor stole for his own, and so he sought to console us after Melkor's disobedience to him.

'My children', said he, 'Remember that all songs within the music of the Ainur do but complement my will in the end. Even Melkor's defiance in the music makes my plan the better ere the end. And so too does your presence within it. 

'Extreme heat and cold did Melkor sing of, thanks to the lilting song of you, Strong Tulkas and you, Dancing Nessa. It's melody was haunting to him and your nearness to him during the song was I shall be honest, influential in the chaos he created. However, it all bodes well in the end my daughter. You shall soon see and you shall soon understand.'

And I do understand now. Now as I dance for my husband upon lawns of unfading green in Valimar, his bright eyes trained on my figure as I move sensually for him and him alone, like I did that day when he finally took me as his wife. I dance like I danced in the time of the Spring of Arda across the grass of Almaren, beckoning to him to follow me and forget the misery of what we helped create, for now I know that such balance is necessary.

And I know that he knows that too, and that he knows his toil upon this world has finally come to an end, and now he may run with me over the fields of Aman. For only he can keep pace with me as I rush through the swaying grass, dancing in the light of the fair day, and none can keep up with us when we take free across the lands. Not even my gentle brother Oromë upon Nahar his steed could over take us if we took flight, fleeing from the light of his smile.

He has often tried, but is never greeted by anything more than my beloved's booming laughter.

I approach my husband slowly and run my hands through his hair of gold and a smile I let pass over my soft lips as I lean towards him and speak to him of things that I know worry his soul. 

'Follow me now, my Valiant Astaldo. Our work is over and now may we lie in peace within the embrace of each other's arms, for Melkor is no more – prisoned within the timeless void where he can not escape.

'Lies indeed he has sown, and his mischief shall last till the end of days, but we are free from our bonds of guilt now, my love.' I spoke these words of comfort for I know what few do. I know that he hated Melkor for his distortion of our song.

I know he hated him for warping the beauty of our harmony into bitterness, for taking the song of order and balance and turning it to the extremes.

I try to tell my lover that we are free from our obligations now. We no longer have to fight, for our work here is over at last.

I feel his large hand run through my hair as I try to bring joy back into his gaze, and I see my lover smile as he takes my hand in his.

We begin to run then, our laughter mingling and the deer that I adore frolicking beside us as we finally let ourselves take in the beauty of the world about us.

Finally we know peace.

Finally we are free.

'Yes, my dancer', I hear him whisper in my mind, 'We are free.'

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Tulkas/Astaldo – same person, husband of Nessa (the one telling the tale)

Music of the Ainur – the song that took place at the creation of the world.

Eru – the creator of the Ainur and ultimately the God of them all.


End file.
